Robert Stein (1950)

Robert Stein (1972)

Robert Stein (2000s)

About Me

editor, publisher, media critic and journalism teacher,
is a former Chairman of the American Society of Magazine Editors, and author of “Media Power: Who Is Shaping Your Picture of the World?” Before the war in Iraq, he wrote in The New York Times: “I see a generation gap in the debate over going to war in Iraq. Those of us who fought in World War II know there was no instant or easy glory in being part of 'The Greatest Generation,' just as we knew in the 1990s that stock-market booms don’t last forever.
We don’t have all the answers, but we want to spare our children and grandchildren from being slaughtered by politicians with a video-game mentality."
This is not meant to extol geezer wisdom but suggest that, even in our age of 24/7 hot flashes, something can be said for perspective.
The Web is a wide space for spreading news, but it can also be a deep well of collective memory to help us understand today’s world. In olden days, tribes kept village elders around to remind them with which foot to begin the ritual dance. Start the music.

Tuesday, August 07, 2007

Super Scoop

Stop the presses! The New York Times is breaking big news today. “Competitors, Once Collegial, Now Seem Cool” is the headline for the revelation that “Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama have barely spoken to each other-—at least in any meaningful way--for months.”

If the cool kids are acting like that, what hope is there for us grinds at the J-School? Pretty soon the whole campus will be a hotbed of hostility. Maybe they’ll kiss and make up at the pep rally on the football field tonight and even go out for a malt together after. Wouldn’t that be keen?